Eurasia in the making

While Americans make up their minds who will be the lesser evil as president between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump, and while Europe is straying around in their home-made identity crisis, there is another large part of the world that seems to stealthily but gradually be getting its act together. Ever since Russia was shunned by the West about 2 years ago, diplomatic efforts to bring Eurasia closer together are running on full speed.

Call it what you will, but the biggest geopolitical blunder on the part of the US has driven two of the largest military and economic powers on earth into each others’ arms. The Crimea-triggered sanctions almost forced Vladimir Putin’s hand to turn south to find new friends, and Beijing couldn’t believe their luck in the face of unlimited resource supplies that for the better part of a year were to be had at hugely discounted prices.

It wasn’t just oil and gas though that has brought those previously unlikely allies together. Naturally complementing trading patterns, as in one has insatiable demand for resources whereas the other is in need of technologies they have been deprived of due to sanctions, China’s generational vision of One Road, One Belt, as well as a distinctive disdain for US geopolitics provide ample reasons for an increased sense of allegiance.

And the two mean business. This space has in the past elaborately commented on China’s forays into much of the rest of Asia and Putin’s blitz diplomacies from Turkey to Japan. In light of the new mutual amenabilities a previously rather unknown political, economic and military Eurasian construct called Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, or simply SCO, has risen to fame over the past couple of years.

It was as early as 1996, when China, Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan founded a group called the Shanghai Five, for the purpose of security exchange and investment and trading across the Eurasian plate. In 2001, it was renamed to SCO, expanded by Uzbekistan, and India and Pakistan were admitted as full members in 2015. Last week the 15th prime ministers’ meeting of SCO was held in Kyrgyzstan’s capital Bishkek.

SCO is a god-sent for the Central Asian nations, and it perfectly serves the interests of China and Russia of harmonising the geographical buffer between them. China is pumping funds into the region and paving the way for massive infrastructure build-outs in the context of One Road. Russia has managed to renew resource agreements and is in the process of gaining the largest influence over them since the demise of the Soviet Union.

China’s premier Li Keqiang not only attended the SCO meeting in Bishkek, primarily pushing for a free trade zone among its members, he also visited Russia and Kazakhstan. Kazakhstan in particular has landed billions of Chinese money for joint projects, and its president Nazarbayev met with Putin no less than 8 times this year, the last time praising their relation to have qualities of an alliance and strategic partnership in Astana last month.

All four Central Asian nations are also AIIB members and tied to its cause. There is also talk to set up a SCO development bank. I believe we ain’t seen nothing yet. China is determined to build One Road and elevate those nations with it, and it has a worthwhile partner with Russia. India and Pakistan will be crucial with regards to the One Belt initiative. In short, interests are aligned, and trade and investment volumes can only go one way from here.

I wouldn’t be surprised if the last of the Central Asian nations were also to be taken into the SCO fold soon. There have recently been quite a few overtures by Turkmenistan not to miss the boat. Their president travelled to Moscow last week to revive bilateral ties, pleading to be a reliable ally to “great Russia”. The country needs Russian support to best exploit its resources, and China will be a welcoming partner for the aforementioned reasons.

Lots is happening in this space, and it is amazing how ambitiously and disciplined the stakeholders are working on their common success. The alliance could, or rather is likely, to expand much further. While the current SCO members will become hosts to the northern route of One Road, into Russia, Iran and then places like Turkey will be crucial for its southern route, into Europe.

A vastly dynamic process across the Eurasian plate is emerging, one that the US cannot really contribute to, let alone control it. China and Russia are firmly in the drivers’ seats. It inevitably raises the prospect of security consequences, as the still-sole superpower will not be able to help but meddle with it. And as we are so painfully aware, much of what is existential to other nations America is usually prone to make a pig’s breakfast out of.